Ludwig
by SadRebel
Summary: Newmann/platonic/family - Newt set's out to create a pet and Hermann eventually comes around to the idea of being a family. This is not a promise that everything will be OK. One shot.


**Ludwig.**

It started out as an experiment with what was left of the Kaiju entrails and a dying skin parasite. Newt found it, rescued it and brought it back to the lab, placing the tiny, feeble creature in a glass dome like a sick baby, feeding it and tending to it and, eventually, putting it on some sort of life support system. At first, Hermann hated it with a burning passion, said it was disgusting, but Newt had decided he was going to make himself a pet and – _surprisingly_ – Herc said that Newt had his full support. On the assumption that the half-parasite, half-Kaiju hybrid was to be used for research and possibly medicinal purposes. Newt was overjoyed, Hermann was livid, but they eventually agreed that _half-parasite, half-Kaiju hybrid_ was too long a name and instead "it" became "Ludwig".

"I'm telling you, you're wrong," said Newt without looking over his shoulder. Hermann was scribbling away on his blackboard, but occasionally he turned his head to increase the volume of his words, "you're feeding it the wrong things, Newton, it's getting smaller."

"Well, what do you want me to feed _HIM_ then, huh Hermann? _Numbers_? Because that's what you bring to the table and numbers don't help grow Kaiju."

"We… _you_ are not growing a Kaiju, Newton, this is an experiment."  
"He doesn't mean that," Newt told the parasite, face pressed up against the glass. There are wires and tubes going in and out of its body but the monitor Newt fashioned out of rubbish, much the same way he fashioned the PONS units sitting on his desk, hums steadily. "He doesn't mean all those nasty things he says. You're a healthy weight; don't let anyone ever tell you different."

"Give me strength." Herman rolled his eyes so forcibly Newt could practically hear his nerves scraping together from the other side of the room.

The dividing tape had long since disappeared, as had the clutter of Kaiju entrails and world-ending predictions. Standing lamps had replaced the darkness, photographs and newspaper clippings immortalising Mako Mori and Rayleigh Beckett had replaced the strange stains on the walls. Volumes of mathematics had replaced sketches of the Throat. K-science was a quieter place, down in the centre of what was left of the Shatterdome. Newt and Hermann had stayed, of course, with nowhere else to go that wouldn't dress them in velvet robes and hand them over to hundreds of disinterested students. Most of the core team had stayed, in fact, to turn the Jaeger program into a program aimed at rebuilding the world. It was almost impossible for the left over inhabitants to think of something else they could be doing with their time. They'd made it their missions to help the world and the world still needed them. And, deep within the dome, in the K-science division, Hermann and Newt had helped themselves to the theory that they were not alone, and whatever was left from the Kaiju attacks could possibly still save them in the future. No one argued, mostly because they'd saved the world.

That hadn't stopped the fighting.

"You need to stop talking over me about this – this isn't your thing!"

"MY THING? Newton Gieszler, everything that is yours is mine as long as you kick it over to my side of the bloody office."

"He doesn't need any of this shit-"

"Immunise that stupid pet project of yours before the entire Shatterdome becomes infected."  
"No one's getting infected," Newt said, deflating, "because no one else is getting bitten…"

"Why on earth would it want to b… oh my god, Newton, what have you done?"

It was almost a constant. Newton would do something to or for Ludwig, Hermann would get mad, they'd yell and then the silence would split their office in the same way screaming would and it was _deafening_. Newt would always break it, cooing and coddling to the little parasite in the bell-jar bed, adjusting the wires, or fiddling with knobs. And Hermann would do what he had done after every screaming match for the last eleven years. Sigh, huff, and make them tea.

"We're like a family, you know," said Newt one night, while they were late in the lab, sharing the futon and sipping Lady Grey from tin mugs. Ludwig meeped and buzzed beside Newt, while he pushed his support trolley back and forth comfortingly.

"We? You mean you, me and the monster."

"I wish you wouldn't call him names."

"Newton, _mein schatz_, it is a project. It will be killed and dissected and sold to cancer researchers or something. It is not a plaything and you cannot become attached to it. We only gave it a name to put something on the documentation. Newt?"

Newt had gone very stiff in Hermann's lap, "we're not selling him."

"Newton, be reasonable." Hermann tried to sound sympathetic – Newt had put a lot into this project and clearly had fallen into a trap regarding his affection for the thing.

"We're not selling him. No one is cutting him up," Newt disentangled himself from Hermann, "we're a family."

"Newt, it can't even breathe on its own yet." Hermann said, ever so softly.

"He will."

Hermann watched, secretly fascinated, as Ludwig grew under Newt's care. He watched the little tendrils that grew out of the thing's back, the changing skin colour, the paling of its outer shell, the blue of its extremities. If they stayed late at the lab, late enough that the rest of the dome was silent with sleep, and set the lamps low at just the right time, Hermann watched as the little bug glowed an eerie greenish blue in the darkness. He watched Newt fall more and more in love with the project and he, in turn, just a little more in love with Newt. Nothing else lit up quite the way Newton's face did when Hermann smiled, or when Ludwig showed any signs of improvement. The Kaiju were long gone. Ludwig gave Newt's life a purpose.

In the spring, Newt decided to go back to university, get another degree (online, of course), and open a cinema in the mess hall – Godzilla movies every Friday night. He tried to get Hermann to wear chinos and Converse, helped Mako dye all of her hair electric blue. He smiled more, spent more time in total calm, which in turn affected Hermann. He eventually got Hermann to agree to convert his "grandfather pants" but sneakers proved a mite too much. They spent more time outside. The closer they got, less nightmares came, less screaming happened, less silence followed. Ludwig grew every day, but still he could not breathe on his own.

"We need to try something else," Hermann said one day.

Newt looked up from his laptop, "huh?"

"I said-" "Hermann I heard you perfectly. I'm just… surprised you care."

In the past that might have elicited a yelling match but Newt was giving him the same bewildered look that he had gotten the night they cancelled the apocalypse and Hermann had consented to being touched.

"We're a family." Hermann responded, and Newt was pressing their faces together before Hermann even registered that he'd gotten out of his chair.

"Stoppit, stoppit, it's not working." Newt fretted, admonishing himself. Ludwig had well outgrown the bell-jar and needed transferring to a larger bed. But the cords kept getting tangled and the monitors were going off, and Newt's head was spinning but he needed to do this, imploring the beeping to just _stop_ and Hermann had to watch, had to stand off to the side in silence because if he got anywhere near this disaster the parasite would shriek in its tiny voice and Newt would scream. It was as if the pain the bug was feeling was being transferred onto Newt, which given their closeness was entirely possible. Newt oftentimes complained of a stiff leg if Hermann ever had a bad day.

"Come on, _schneckchen,_ just a little more, we're almost there… It's not that bad." He kicked a silent monitor out of the way, pulled the cords attached to Ludwig taut to give himself more reach and slid the parasite into his new bed between breaths. It wasn't until the lid was closed and the lab had returned to silence that Newt allowed his legs to give way and his body to crumple to the floor. Hermann gingerly joined him, wrapping his arms around the other man.

"You did it, and it's over."

"I did it."

Above them Ludwig, with the help of his breathing machine, snored oblivious to what had just transpired.

"How is the experiment coming?"

Herc was staring at the baby dome, one eyebrow raised. Max had been made to stay at the door, just in case.  
"Fine, fine, here." Newt shoved some paper into Herc's hands, "these are my notes, please don't crowd him."

Pushed out of the way, Herc looked inquiringly towards Hermann, but received no support in return.

Hermann didn't even look up from his data entry, "please don't crowd Ludwig, he scares easily."

Herc blank faced them both and left. This was getting out of hand but what was he supposed to do about it? Steal their parasitic baby in the dead of night? He was sure they both slept in the K-science office anyway.

As soon as Herc was gone, Newt was pressed up against the glass, "how are you today, little one?" while Hermann looked over the frame of his glasses, tweaking the corners of his mouth ever so slightly.

"What are we, Hermann?" Newt asked, walking over to sit on the corner of his desk. Hermann yanked his paperwork out from underneath his partner, "in what context?"

Newt lay himself down over everything Hermann was working on like a cat.

"You know I might love you?"

"_Might_?"

"Just a bit."

"I believe we are supposed to be a family, _spatzi_. You, me, and Ludwig."

Newt reached up to run his hand through Hermann's short hair, and Hermann turned into the touch.

"I'm glad you came around."

"You made it incredibly hard not to."

"Hermann… Hermann something's wrong."

"Pardon?"

"With Ludwig…" Newt sounded frantic as Hermann made his way across the office, "Hermann… I think he's sick."

"Explain." Hermann didn't raise his voice but his tone gave no room for argument. If he could keep Newt level headed, Newt would be able to fix whatever was wrong. Up a dosage or remove a tube. They'd done it before enough times to know panicking did not help.

"He's tendrils are brittle… that's not right… and his skin is darker… This isn't right, Hermann, he's reverting, I think he's changing back."

Newt pushed Hermann out of the way, dancing around the baby dome, touching wires and tapping screens, maybe this, maybe that. Hermann stepped well out of his path and watched. Newt would fix this, Newt would find a way.

"I think the tissue is breaking down… I think his body is rejecting the Kaiju tissue which doesn't make sense – and after all this time. He should be OK. He should be breathing on his own by now!"

"NEWTON calm down." Hermann ordered but Newt was hysterical. "We do not know for certain this is what is happening and your freaking out will achieve nothing - you need to slow your breathing."

Newt knelt down, shaking and crying and Hermann had to get down beside him because he was in fact not slowing his breathing - he was not breathing at all.

Hermann did not know what to do. He never did. A panic attack was just something you waited out with patience and helpful words. You got them to control their breathing, then relax, and then rest.

"Newton, I need you to breathe."

Hermann stood watch over Ludwig. They had transferred him back to the bell-jar. Suddenly his new bed had just seemed far too big. The rise and fall of the breathing tube attached to the bug was erratic but somehow it gave Hermann hope. On the futon, Newt was sleeping. Hermann had been forced to take drug related measures after Newt refused to leave Ludwig's side. Hermann pressed his hand to the glass, "you have no idea what is happening, _schneckchen_, or what I am saying –but it would be… preferable if you did not die… if you stayed here. You will never know how much calm you bring. I would… very much like you to live."

Obviously, Ludwig did not react. Hermann had not expected him to.

Hermann retreated to the futon and lowered himself on to it, arranging his body to work next to Newt's splayed limbs. There was only one lamp on in the office but from where he was lying he could still see the faint rise and fall of the breathing tube and this meant, possibly, that it was going to be OK.

"Newton loves you, you know. We are a family."

Ludwig does not last the night. They find him in the early morning, when the drugs and fatigue have worn off, immobile in his crib. He had suffered no pain; simply he had ceased to breathe. His little white body is covered in sparkling blue tendrils which had burst forth from between the cracks in his chitin, and were glowing steadily as the lamp light pervaded the room. Hermann does not know how he is supposed to react. Selfishly though, instead of turning to comfort the crying Newt beside him, he feels tears on his own face and lets them fall. _It was supposed to be OK_. _They were supposed to be a family_. Newt reaches for his hand and he entwines their fingers in the silence.


End file.
